Eight cats in a small household is really too many, and as Esk has got older, she has got more and more unhappy. And so she – and her lifelong companion, Ptep – have packed their little spotted handkerchieves and emigrated to East Anglia, to live with our daughter and grandson in Norwich.

We won’t tell you about the horrors of trying to get them into their cat baskets, or the astonishing amount of wah-ing they did on a 5.5 hour drive. But we got them there, and as you can see, they are looking very stressed indeed in their new home. They are perfectly happy with Clare, although less sure of Harry; he tends to flail and make noises in an unpredictable manner.

On their first night, they knocked a plant pot over and deposited earth all over the floor, and on their fourth night they found the Christmas turkey carcass and ravaged it, so we think they’re doing fine.

We shall miss them more than we can say; not every household has a feline walrus of lurve … but they are happy, Clare is happy, and the whole dynamic of the Tribe has changed. I’ll be writing more about that later.